Mausoleum Gate – Into A Dark Divinity (2017)

Offering up another classic dose of doom and heavy metal, we have Finland’s Mausoleum Gate with their sophomore release, Into A Dark Divinity. These guys pride themselves on psychedelic seventies influences, folky acoustics and soaring vocal aesthetics. Keyboards are especially useful throughout the disc, especially when the band wants to prog-jam and turn what would normally be four minute cuts into nearly eleven minute epics, as a piece like “Apophis” showcases. Even opener “Condemned To Darkness” offers a slight dose of smooth jazz, bringing a sort of Pink Floyd landscape to the mix, which will also sound right at home for fans of Camel or King Crimson. These guys very well might just be as proggy as they are comitted to old school doom/heavy metal, which is still done justice in shorter tracks like “Burn The Witches At Dawn”, “Solomon’s Key” and “Horns.” Neither of these even approach the five-minute mark, allowing the album’s balladic title cut and prog-jam “Apophis” enough breathing room to stand out amongst the rest. It might have been easier or more expectable for the band to release an entire album of ten minute plus epics, but I’m glad that they didn’t, as it shows the versatility of an act that doesn’t have to reply on it’s space-jammy antics to get your head turning. But a little bit of space jam is nice every now and again.

If you’re a fan of heavily keyboard-laden heavy/doom, then I think you’re going to love this, because the keys really seem to be the core element of the performance aside from the shorter cuts, which blaze with their own level of fire. Towards the end, the disc starts to sound a little bit more spatial than it’s demonic cover might enforce, but I do see planets swirling about on said cover as well, so perhaps that’s not too far off.